DNA Story Update

Yesterday I spoke to the 4th great grandson of a slave owner that had enslaved some of our relatives. So, what did y’all do yesterday?  Cousin Desi, you need to call me! 
 
Cousin Desi did call me last night and we talked until we both were too sleepy to concentrate. So, here is the back story. Remember that time I took a DNA test and traced my enslaved fifth great-grandparents, Joe & Jenny McLean, to a small town in North Carolina called Barbecue. And remember when Cousin Desi did all that family history research on Joe and Jenny McLean and brought over 100 DNA cousins together, some he found on Ancestry.com like me, to his first DNA Family Fest in North Carolina in 2023.  Well, one of the daughters of Joe and Jenny, Lucy McLean, was bought or sold and ended up in Newton, Mississippi.  Lucy married Richard Chapman, and they had a bunch of kids. The 4th great grandson of the slave owner who we believed was the father of Richard Chapman contacted me on Ancestry and left his telephone number for me to call him. 
 
Y’all, know I called him.  His name is Jerry Mason, and he lives in Quitman, Mississippi.  He is a retired historian.  He was genuinely nice, and we laughed a lot.  He was also very frank and said that his 4th great grandfather William Albert Chapman Sr. born in 1780, in North Carolina, had fathered many children from his enslaved women.  William Albert Chapman Sr. died in 1858 in Wayne County, Mississippi. Our ancestor Richard Chapman was listed in Jerry’s family tree as a half sibling to his 4th great grandfather William’s children.  Jerry wanted to know if I had any information on his ancestor’s slaves.  We agreed to text each other and share any information we had. 
 
While I had Jerry on the phone I asked if he had any information about the Howze families that had lived in Wayne County and in Shubuta. I told him that I was trying to find information about my great grandmother Florence Howze. He said that he had just spoken to a lady who was a descendant of a Howze family, and he gave me a name which I plan to follow up with. 
 
Cousin Desi Campbell produced the DVD documentary “A Slave Named Jenny” last year.  Desi and cousin Deena Hill will be presenting their research about Jenny and how they met and worked together to document and tell our ancestor’s story at this year’s Family Search RootsTech March 6-8, 2025, in Salt Lake City, Utah. Watch the video below for more info.  

A Slave Named Jenny ​